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Knocking our heads against a brick wall

I WAS looking through the deeds of our house last week, hoping to find out who was responsible for the boundaries. Our right-hand garden wall is about to fall down and could kill the tortoise or, even worse, one of my grandchildren.

I've got an estimate to rebuild it - of £10,000. Which is twice what we paid for the house itself. Did I moan. Of course not. Then someone in the street told me each house is responsible for their left-hand garden wall only - which would mean, if true, that our next-door neighbour would have to pay for it. Ha ha.

Our house deeds are works of art - beautiful copperplate handwriting on thick, coated vellum. The earliest is dated 1861 when a builder called John Edgar bought land from the Earl of Dartmouth. His London estate and orchard used to be on the site of our street, which is why